Smash World
by Firemaster23
Summary: An online game goes bad. Can the players escape the game? Can the hackers be defeated?
1. Incarnation

Hey people. This is my first try at a fanfic so I would appreciate some constructive criticism. So, I hope you like the story and please review it and give me some advice. Oh there is some bad language, but it is rated T for a reason.

It had only been a week, but I couldn't wait. Summer was here, and I had to get back on my computer. That must have been my whole life - video games, YouTube, you name it. I had friends and did well in school, but the computer held my soul. Parting from it could be dangerous.

As I got onto the Internet, I noticed that the page was loading quite slowly today.

"Damn it!" I yelled, slapping the side of the computer, "Work, you piece of shit"

I stopped myself from finishing my sentence as a box popped up on the screen. It seemed to be a pop-up from some sort of gaming site. I clicked on the "X" symbol in the top right corner, but instead of closing it, it opened up the site.

"'Smash World', huh?" I asked myself as I read off the title. I read further, "Massively Multi-Player Online Role-Playing Game, starring the members of the Smash Brothers video games series, along with many newcomers. It sounds... interesting."

I had played the Smash Bros series, but never an online RPG based on it. I continued, "Offering a full PvP environment, you can customize your own character, create their very own unique abilities and furnish a fully usable house for them. Sounds like every other game." I sighed before continuing, "I guess I'll try it. The browser froze, anyways."

I moved the mouse over to a "Play Now!" button. I clicked it, and it opened a full screened game window.

"Let's get started, then."

A character model chart popped up, displaying at least a hundred different video game characters. I scrolled down, reading the characters' names on the way.

"Mario, Kirby, Olimar, Mewtwo... looks like they added in the Melee characters. Roy, Pichu, Marth, Lucario, Cactuar... what's a Cactuar? Oh well. Yoshi, Bowser... Ike!"

I immediately clicked when I saw my favorite character. After I clicked, there were a lot of extra options, like hair color, eye color, clothing, etc. I modified my Ike so that his hair was red, like Roy's, and gave him blue clothing with gold trim. I always liked Roy's clothes, but I preferred Ike to Roy. Afterwards, I clicked a button that said "Continue". Suddenly, I heard Mom calling for me from downstairs.

"Micah," she yelled. "dinner's ready! Come down."

"No thanks," I yelled back, "I'm not hungry now. Maybe later?" The great thing about Mom was that she didn't mind not feeding me.

_Video games are nourishment enough, anyways. _I thought to myself, snickering.

I turned back to the game, and noticed that it asked for a username. For that, I typed in "FireMaster". A pop up said "This username is already in use. Try again."

After many tries, it finally settled on "FireMaster23". And so the game - and the rest of my summer - began.

My character spawned in a brilliant white light. Unlike Super Smash Bros, this game had 3D controls. I tried using the mouse and control buttons to move, but it wasn't doing anything. Two characters came up to mine. They seemed to be talking to each other, so they must have been player characters, you know, PC's. One was a Marth, the other was a Yoshi. They were clad in black. Well, the Yoshi just _was_ black.

"Hey," the Yoshi said, "that must be a newbie. Or he's AFK. Might be easy pickings. Wanna try?"

"Sure," the Marth replied, "let's."

I didn't expect help, but I didn't expect to be beat up on, either. The two were slashing and punching me like I was a fucking Sandbag. After a few more hits, my screen flashed with a red tint. The only way I would survive was if someone came and helped. The chances were against me, but guess what happened? Suddenly, the Yoshi was frozen where he stood, encased in shining ice. The Marth jumped back in surprise.

"What the-"

The nimble swordsman leaped out of the way of a blue ball of energy. Out of nowhere, a Zelda PC appeared. She had a flowing teal dress on, and had black butterfly-like wings on her back. Weirdest of all was her skin. It was strongly tinted with a pale blue.

"Sh-Shadow?" the Marth exclaimed, "I...I'm sorry, don't kill me! We-we were just having a little fun!"

With a wave of "Shadow"'s hand, the frozen Yoshi broke to pieces.

"It's too late," she said, "you picked the wrong side of this war!"

She fired another bolt of ice at the fleeing Marth, who froze on the spot.

She turned to me, finally. Honestly, If I were my character, I would've died of fright.

"Hey," she said, "I suppose you need a little help here, don't you?"

I sighed in relief and gave myself a head-desk, because a face-palm wasn't enough. She _had_ just saved me from those PC's. It was stupid to think that she'd turn on me.

"Well," she explained, "you should try plugging a controller into the USB port. It'll help if you have an adaptor."

I did, and I plugged it in. Using the controller, I found that the controls were quite simple.

"Now," she continued, "put a headset on. That way, the computer will broadcast what you say. It'll help during battles."

I had a headset too, so I plugged it in and began to speak.

"Hello, hello, one, two three."

The Zelda PC smiled and said, "Great. It works. By the way, my name is Shadow. Princess Shadow."

"Er... thanks Shadow. I'm FireMaster23."

"FireMaster, eh? A perfect balance to my ice."

Suddenly, the frozen Marth broke.

"Uh..." I mumbled, pointing at the shattered swordsman, "what is that attack?"

"Oh, this?" she asked, as she froze a nearby tree. "Absolute Zero."

"I see. So, you said something about a war. I thought this was an RPG... battling monsters and the such."

Shadow sighed before explaining, "This is a PvP game - there are only PC's. Originally, we just fought in tournaments and stuff like that, but eventually, this controversy rose about whether or not it was okay to hack the game for instant level-ups and such. Because of that, the server split into a pro-hacking army and an anti-hacking army. Now, players are hunted down by others of the opposing army. Most people are just militia - pawns that their superiors use for for 'the greater purpose'. I, however, am an accomplished soldier. I hunt down enemy militia and I recruit new members. So. What do you say, wanna join me?"

"What side are you on?"

"Well, it's a non-issue, but the anti-hacks. I'm for playing fair."

"All right then. Take me God knows where. A house, perhaps?"

"Exactly."

We began to walk out into a clearing, and in the distance, I could see a very large gate. I ran towards it, but slowed down when Shadow couldn't keep up. About halfway to the gate, Shadow began to speak.

"You know," she said, "it would definitely be good to group up with some other fighters. The hackers can ambush you at any time."

"I understand," I replied, "but who the hell would join a level one player? I'd probably get in the way."

"That's what senior players are for. You'll get some of their experience too. It's a win-win for you. In fact, I'll even help you. I'll introduce you to someone else later."

"All right."

The gate now loomed over us. Its size was very menacing, but it radiated a warm, safe feeling. Shadow touched it, and it quickly swung open, its stone hinges creaking.

"Now then, rookie. An empty house _should_ be waiting for you to the left there. You'll be able to tell. I have to go and restock on recovery items and such. We'll meet up here later."

The girl went off in the opposite direction. I walked off to the place she pointed out. Surprisingly, my house was obvious to spot. On the mailbox was the name "FireMaster23". When I walked in, a box popped up on the screen. I dropped the controller and switched to the mouse and clicked on the "Open" button. It seemed to be a shop. I was given 300,000 Gold and the option to buy what I wanted. After a few minutes, my house was fully furnished with a fridge, sofa, a TV, bed and a table with chairs. Afterwards, I only had half the money I started with, but it was no waste.

If I opened the fridge, I would be given a large amount of food. If I ate food, I would be healed. If a sat at the table, foods' effects doubled. Sofas were good for watching TV, which displayed _actual _channels. Sleeping in bed all day would fully heal my character, but it was still early in-game. Since I was done here, I headed back to the gate.

There was Shadow and a Pikachu in a leather coat and sunglasses on his head.

"Hey, noob!" the Pikachu squeaked in a bratty tone. "You're late!"

"Shove* off, jack ass." was my reply.

It looked like "Brattachu" was going to yell back a response, but Shadow interjected, "Uh...children? Save it for the enemies. This little rat here-" she gave a slight kick to the Pokemon PC, "-is DragonMaster4427. Dragon, meet FireMaster23. FireMaster, meet Dragon."

We mumbled greetings and turned our attention back on Shadow. She continued on, explaining what they were going to do.

"All right," she said, "we're just going to train today. Mainly because of our newb friend, we will go to the plains to the east; those are where enemy militiamen train. If we're lucky, we'll have five minutes before they raise an alert, so defeat as many as possible."

A minute or so after they had left for the plains, I started to wonder aloud.

"What happens when you die in-game?"

Shadow quickly answered, "Normally, you're turned into a trophy, like in Brawl, and have to wait until someone reactivates you. However, some special attacks, like Absolute Zero, completely destroy an enemy. Then, the enemy travels back to their house."

"Oh."

As we got closer to the plains, the feeling that something bad was going to happen got more intense. There didn't seem to be anyone in the training grounds. No enemy. Suddenly, Shadow readied herself for battle.

Dragon moaned, "Aw... now?"

Confused, I pulled out my sword and asked, "What's wrong, you two? Everything looks perfectly normal-"

A small ball of fire caught me off guard, burning my shoulder. As my PC clenched the burn, Dragon fired a bolt of lightening at the source - two new PC's, a Mario and a Fox. They were dressed in the original character suits, so they didn't strike me as the most ambitious players.

The Fox reflected the attack, but it fizzed out just halfway to its new target. Shadow fired an Absolute Zero at the enemy. The Fox put up a reflector, but to no avail. It sailed straight over his head and nailed the unsuspecting Mario. The Mario skidded back a few feet, heels dug into the ground. However, he wasn't frozen. Shadow gasped at her inability to freeze, but caught herself as she reflected an incoming fireball. Unlike the Farore's Wind of Smash fame, this reflector was full of snowflakes, and whirled in a circular shape. When the fiery projectile connected, it froze and flew back as an ice-ball. It hit the Fox in the face, sending him sprawling backwards.

"Damn," Shadow muttered, her PC relaxing a little, "these guys aren't even trying, but we're constantly having to block. It's sad."

I lunged for the Fox. He jumped off the ground, but I landed a solid slash to his leg, knocking him back onto the grass. I plunged my sword into him, and without any sign of injury, he began to have a spasm on the ground. His limbs were flailing, his face was wincing, but he showed no bodily harm. Typical of a Smash Bros game.

Refusing to remove my sword, I just watched. Smiling, I said, "You know, I could do this shit all day." Finally, I took out my sword and - like a golf club - launched the Fox PC towards his partner. They pulled off a cartoon-like stumble and rolled onto the ground together.

"Hey," the Mario PC said, "we give up, we give up. We just wanted to see if you were any good."

"Oh?" Shadow asked, charging an Absolute Zero, "Why? Who the heck* do you think you are?"

"Well, I'm Super64. My friend here is 1337f0x."

Shadow's mouth was gaping wide. I, on the other hand, was confused as hell.

"Who are you two? What's so special about you? What's keeping us from finishing you off?"

"What's keeping us from fighting them?" Shadow asked, rhetorically, "Maybe the fact that they could wipe us out easily?"

_That strong? But... we were kicking their asses just a bit ago..._

"They're high up in the ranks of our army; a moderator and a hacker working with us."

After a few minutes of explanations, we left and went our separate ways - I went back to my character's house. I had him lie down after this hard, long day. Hopefully, I would have as eventful a day tomorrow as I did yesterday. The screen dimmed, and finally succumbed to the darkness.

So that is the first chapter of the story. I hope you liked it. Oh yea, I nearly forgot the disclaimer. I do not own any video game characters mentioned, like Mario, Kirby, and Ike, nor do I own Super64 or 1337F0x. There, I put it in, I'm done.


	2. Initiation

First of all, I owe much credit to Shippidge, the creator of the popular Smashtasm machinima. I was heavily inspired by his works, hence half of the characters. I hope that this fiction is good, since I've been working on it for longer than you could imagine. Well, I better start before you get bored to death and decide to come to my house with a riot all ready.  
>I started up the "next day" of Smash World. Time passed quicker than real life while in-game, so I just had to wait a bit before FireMaster23 was well-rested. I started to walk out the door and saw Princess Shadow waiting with a protesting DragonMaster4427.<br>"No!" he whined, "I don't wanna, I don't wanna!"  
>"What the hell," I asked, "is he crying about?"<br>"Oh," Shadow replied, "he doesn't want to go questing with you."  
>"Oh, really? Why could that possibly be?"<br>"I don't know. Dragon is Dragon, and always will be Dragon. How 'bout you? You gonna whine, too?"  
>"Oh, no. After I've seen the shit you can do, I don't feel like pissing you off any time soon."<br>"Good," she said, dropping Dragon, whom she had picked up by the tail, "you learn fast. Let's go. I found a nice job we can do. We just have to ambush a hacks brigade in the mountains. They're supposed to be, like, level six, so it shouldn't be too far out of your level range. You're like, three, right?"  
>"Four. And you'd better catch Brattachu; he's running away."<br>Noticing that I was right, she teleported from in front of me to in front of Dragon, where she grabbed by his tail again and tellied back to me.  
>"I hate you." Dragon said, his face entirely serious.<br>"I have that effect on some people." I replied.  
>Dragon in tow, me and Shadow walked over to the gate. There, we saw two familiar faces.<br>"Yo!" 1337f0x exclaimed, waving to us.  
>"Wh-what are you doing here?" Shadow asked, surprise showing on her PC's face.<br>"Oh," Super64 replied, "we decided to come along on your little quest. After all, it'd be a waste to not watch the legendary Shadow run her daily quests."  
>"Oh, I'm not all that special..."<br>"Well, the rest of the moderators think you're a good soldier, too. All that aside, let's get going!"  
>After about six minutes of wandering the area, looking for a good place to scale the mountain, I started talking to Shadow.<br>"I still don't really get all this stuff. You're a legendary witch-"  
>"Sorceress."<br>"Whatever. And they're legendary heroes on our side. Why exactly are these things so important to this world? It's like actual life heroes, worship and all."  
>"Well, you see, Smash World is very realistic. As in, full of realism. Kill or be killed. There's a constant struggle over the power in this game, and heroes who help to keep us up are worshipped like real heroes. That's because if you're side is losing by enough, you're treated very differently. If the opposing side manages to take over the city you live in, then you are forced to pay double price for supplies. You can only do your enemies' quests. You can be killed in the middle of town, and it can be as long and annoying as your enemy wants it to be. You would be a third class citizen. You don't matter. Fortunately, our houses are built in the capital, so we don't really worry about invasion from the enemy. The only places where you're safe here are the capital of your faction and the neutral border town. It lies in between the factions' capital."<br>"Okay...so this game's war has big enough stakes to make everyone want to join in."  
>"Basically. Right now, our forces are winning, but only by a bit."<br>"Oh. Something else has me wondering too. The enemy, the pro-hacks, are referred to as 'hacks,' but you never really told me about what they call us."  
>"Well, it sounds weird, but they call us 'leaguers.' Probably because the moderators that govern our side are called the League Council. We just call them the Assembly, though."<br>"Hey," Dragon said, cutting off our conversation, "we found a good spot to climb the mountain. It's a whirly road-"  
>"Please," Shadow pleaded, "call it a route. Use smart words."<br>"Okay. A route that lies almost completely flat, with no big bumps or straight walls to climb. Should be easy for noobs."  
>I noticed that he glanced at me when he said that.<br>"All right!" I exclaimed, ignoring his rudeness.  
>"Let's go, then." Shadow agreed.<br>We proceeded to walk up the mountain path. It wasn't cold or dark out, but the mountain had an aura about it that chilled me to the bone. If you hadn't seen the, uh, sky blue sky, then you would have thought that we were doing some messed up haunted house dare on Halloween. The rocks were shaped like skulls lodged in walls, wailing like banshees of some sort. If it were night, I might have peed myself.  
>"So," I murmured, voice quivering just a little, "what kind of mountain is this?"<br>"It.." Dragon replied, sounding almost as nervous as me, "it's called Mount Murk."  
>"Quite aptly named, isn't it?" Shadow interjected, "Murk meaning gloom, darkness or obscurity."<br>"Oh," I joked, "so I guess you should feel right at home here, shouldn't you? And where did you get that description?"  
>"Well, someone in the Assembly has an agent that's like, really big on definitions, and he writes out all of our maps. On the index page, he keeps very detailed descriptions on each place, and he's especially proud of this place. Supposedly, he discovered it and even has a home established here. Not a permanent one though - permanent homes are made at the first town you ever visit at the first time you arrive."<br>"Cool-ish."  
>Suddenly, a very loud and high pitched yelp erupted from a few yards away. From that direction came a charging Link PC. It was dressed like the original Link from the Legend of Zelda games and appeared to be a guy. I could've been wrong, though. I'm no expert on identifying what gender a person is, especially when they <em>look<em> like a guy but sound like a _girl_.  
>"Die, cursed hacks!" he yelled, brandishing a sword and charging straight at me. My instant reaction was to jump to the side and draw my sword, but I didn't even have to swing. He kept running forward, and fell off the sheer edge of the cliff.<br>"You blasted cheaters!" he proclaimed as he dropped straight down.  
>"Er," Dragon said, after a few silent seconds, "don't you think we should get him?"<br>"Yeah." Super64 replied, "You remember Link from the last big series of battles, right, 1337f0x?"  
>"Yes, I do. And I'd rather we just leave him there. Last I checked, he was, what, level sixteen? He's a pointless hassle."<br>"I agree," Shadow said, "after all, I'm at a much higher level than him, and FireMaster managed to defeat him without even a single attack."  
>"B-but I didn't mean to defeat him!" I exclaimed, "He just ran at me and I dodged!"<br>"It's okay. You got experience by taking two steps, so I must say that your skills have improved by quite a bit."  
>"But...but I didn't do anything!"<br>"Doesn't matter. Don't be so evasive about it; it's not like you'll get charged with manslaughter."  
>"What? They have <em>crimes<em> on this game?"  
>"Yeah. But there's just treason, theft, IRL threats and other things. The only big one is treason. The other two get you banned for a bit, but treason has a pretty bad punishment. If a hack helps us or if a mod helps the hacks, then the first faction can hold their traitor in a Perma-Cell."<br>"Perma-Cell? That sounds threatening."  
>"It is. Normally, if you log off then you'll be back at your house when you log on next. If you logged off in a Perma-Cell, then you'll be there when you log back in, too. And teleportation spells don't work, either. All of your abilities are stripped of you the second they get you in cuffs."<br>"Yeah." 1337f0x interrupted, "those are the risks. Doesn't matter to me much though; I'm at such high a level that I can fend off any attackers."  
>"But couldn't they just hack you and make you weak? Or hack themselves and make them strong?"<br>"No. Those kind of hacks are imperfect. Strength will lower your health and defense to the point that level ones are like tanks. Weakness will increase speed to the point that the weaker can run from his foes and dodge everything they throw at him with ease. Even after that, the hacker will probably have used so much memory that his computer's motherboard would blow up from the stress."  
>"I have no idea what you just said. Until the blowing up part."<br>We all shared a few laughs, but quickly resumed our journey. However, this didn't go long. Eventually, we ran into a purple-armored Samus.  
>"Hello there!" it...no, he exclaimed, "I'm Lamp!"<br>"Yeah, yeah," I said, "let's go. We'll talk about these friends of yours' later, 64."  
>"Hey, Lamp!" Super64 greeted as he invited the Samus PC into the party.<br>_Man, we have me, Shadow, Dragon, 64, 1337 and Lamp. That's six people in the party, and I'm still only level four. Check that; five since that Link PC jumped off the cliff. Speaking of Link PC's..._  
>It seemed that the Link was back. He seemed to be quite shaken from his previous fall. He was holding himself up with his sword, which was a sign in swordsmen that they were getting weak.<br>"I..." he huffed, "I'll defeat you, even if I die as well!"  
>"You realize this is an online game, right?" I asked.<br>"Actually,"1337f0x explained, "this guy thinks it's a little more than that. He thinks he's the _real_ Link.  
>"Oh? So he's like...role-playing?"<br>"A little more."  
>"What are you talking about? Fight me!" The Link exclaimed.<br>He rushed towards me, and I dodged to the left. This time, instead of running, he stopped and turned towards me. Since I hadn't come up with any awesome techniques yet, I swung my sword at him. It nailed him in the shoulder and he flew back a little. He responded with an arrow, shot at max speed. It nicked my arm, but since he was more than three times my level, it did good damage.  
><em>I have to think of something that'll distract him so everyone can help me.<em>  
>"Hey!" I exclaimed, pointing behind him, "it's an army of octoroks!"<br>He whirled around, "Where?"  
>It all ended so fast. I struck him again, Shadow blasted him with Absolute Zero and Dragon sent out an electric shock. Freezing, slashing and shocking at the same time did real damage. The half dead Link succumbed to the damage and fell, enveloped by light. Afterwards, he transformed into a trophy with Link on top, getting his sword ready.<br>"Priceless." I said to myself. I turned to Shadow, "Why did he turn into a trophy, even though you froze him?"  
>"I dunno. Maybe it's because you and Dragon thawed him out before he could break."<br>I walked over to the trophy and tapped its stand, which was high up in the air. It glowed again, and the PC was there.  
>"H-how did you turn me back? I'm no hacker! Hacks can't turn people like me back!"<br>"Because we're not _hacks._ Jack-ass."  
>After a long while of explaining, the PC got it.<br>"Oh. Hi Super64. Hi Lamp. Hi evil hacker man."  
>"I'm not evil." 1337f0x said, "And my name is 1337f0x. Leet. Fox. What's so hard about that?"<br>"Oh?" Lamp exclaimed, "you're name isn't One-Three-Three-Seven-Eff-Zero-Ex?"  
>"No, Lamp. Can't you read leet?"<br>"Nope. But I have a pornographic memory."  
>"You mean a photographic memory."<br>"Nope."  
>"Well," the mysterious Link PC said, "I'd like to be part of your party. My name is Link."<br>"Wait," I said, "your PC's name is Link? How original. And no, you can't come."  
>"But I can help! I'm the Hero of Time!"<br>"Who wears tights. skirts and talking hats. I get it. You aren't joining."  
>"But I can help! I'm level sixteen! You only have a five, a seventeen and a twenty-two! And the others."<br>"That's what makes it sad - you got beaten by a level five. Twice, if we include the cliff."  
>"Come on! I'll still follow you, anyways. At least if you add me, you get my experience."<br>I sighed, "Fine. I guess that's fair. Little freak..."  
>"Huh?"<br>"Nothing. Let's keep going."  
>I guess it was busy at Mount Murk today, because we ran into yet another PC. It was a Wolf with its original costume on.<br>"Hm." he said, looking at the skull rocks, "I wonder what gave the creators of this game the idea to make this mountain. It sure is interesting, to say the least."  
>Suddenly, Link lunged at the Wolf PC. He swung his sword, yelling, "Die!"<br>The Wolf whirled towards him and punched Link directly in the face. I heard a cracking sound, and if this was IRL, I would say that it was every bone in Link's face breaking. He flew backwards and yelped, probably in surprise since he couldn't actually feel the pain. He hit the ground, and several other cracking sounds ensued. He looked down for the count, but he didn't turn into a trophy.  
>"Sorry," Shadow apologized, "Link is a little bit - stupid. Do you think you hurt him much?"<br>"I don't know," he growled, "but if he's any less than level twenty-four, than he probably broke a bone."  
>"That's what I was worried about. Dragon, get over here."<br>"Aw," Dragon whined, "you don't want me to do _that_ again, do you?"  
>"Yes, actually I do."<br>"But that could be five minutes! With...Link! That's verifiable torture!"  
>"I swear, to every god there may be, that if you don't go, I will make the rest of your short life very miserable."<br>"Y-yes, ma'am!"  
>As Dragon stepped closer to the injured Link, I stepped closer to Shadow.<br>"Gods?" I asked, "Are you role-playing?"  
>"No. I believe in multiple gods."<br>"Which ones?"  
>"Uh...let's just say <em>a lot<em>."  
>"Okay..."<br>I heard a strange sound from behind and whirled around to see something unexpected. Dragon, with dragon wings. They were each six feet long, three feet wide and covered in green scales.  
>"That...was unexpected."<br>"Well," Dragon responded, grabbing Link's leg, "what did you expect? I can't use many other custom abilities. So I got an epic one."  
>"Uh," Link murmured nervously, "I get kind of motion sick when I'm using cars and others modes of transportation."<br>"But Dragon's not a mode of transportation," Shadow said with a smile, "he's a nuisance. Go, Dragon. Use the Assembly's Gold; here's my membership card."  
>He nodded and took the silver card that she offered him, flying off towards the town in the distance, dragging Link by his leg, who was screaming.<br>"Hey," I asked, "why the hell did we just send off Link with a flying rat?"  
>"Because he broke his legs. He won't be able to walk, and that could be a hazard. If he dies, then he'd be more of a pain in the ass than he is now."<br>"Oh. What was that card that you gave Dragon? Assembly's Gold?"  
>"Membership cards are given to every member of the Assembly's army. The higher the rank, the more Gold you're allowed to take from the vault. It also affects the rank of the quests you're allowed to, I'm a Major, so I have a silver card. I can take up to about 10,000 Gold each week, and take up to B rank quests. The Assembly is funded through the questing system - thirty percent of our paycheck goes to the vault. That helps when you're going through tough times and need help badly."<br>"Interesting. So when will Brattachu and the Hero of Irritation be coming back?"  
>"In a few minutes. Dragon's fast and dependable - okay, maybe just fast - so they should be here within a minute of Link's leg being mended."<br>"Y'know," the Wolf PC said, "I feel kind of sorry for hitting him. It was just kinda my first reaction to people ambushing me and yelling 'die.' I hope I didn't cause too much trouble."  
>"Nah," I said, "we would have done it soon anyways. What's your name, anyways?"<br>"Wolf."  
>"Oh, yeah. Our generation is <em>really fucking creative!<em>"  
>We all laughed for a little and saw a familiar flying rat heading towards us, Hylian in tow. In just a bit, the two had landed beside us. Dragon sort of sucked his wings back in. He seemed quite drained after using his wings. He doesn't matter though.<br>We all continued along our route, occasionally talking about stuff. As we went up the mountain, the formations got creepier and creepier. The skulls had become misshapen, with fangs, horns and evil grins. Whoever the hell came up with this area watched way too many horror movies. We hadn't seen anyone for quite a while, but we had come across our targets. The hacks. There were three of them, all supposedly level six. One was actually a pair of Ice Climbers, with Popo in white and Nana in black. The others were a familiar looking Black Marth and Yoshi.  
>"Hey!" the Marth yelled out, "that's the bitch who beat us up last time!"<br>"Oh," Shadow said, without any care, "those are the hacks I beat up last time."  
>"How dare you? You come and show your face to us after beating us like that?"<br>"Uh, yeah? This is kind of in League territory."  
>"Sh-shut up! We've gotten stronger since last time, and now we even have Mari and Emmet with us! They're stronger than both of us combined!"<br>"Mari and Emmet?" I asked, "Since when have the Ice Climbers been two separate characters?"  
>"In this game," Shadow explained, "Ice Climber PC's are played as with two players to give them a slight advantage over other players. However, the character team takes twice the normal experience to level up, so it isn't worth it unless you're really good as a team. Be careful, FireMaster."<br>"Whatever, You freeze those two, I'll get rid of the Goth Climbers over here."  
>"Hey!" Mari yelled, "We are <em>not<em> Goths! We're just unseasonably fashionable!"  
>"Cut the crap, Mari," Emmet said without any feeling, "it's not like it matters, anyways. Let's just kill this freak!"<br>Emmet lunged towards me and I parried his hammer strike, throwing him back with my sword by a few feet. Mari took advantage and did the same thing, but I couldn't block or dodge. I hit the wall of the mountain, causing additional damage. I'm sure that my PC would be pissed, but I couldn't help but watch them smack me around for a bit. After a small time of helplessness, I dodged around them and rushed forward, slamming into both of them. Then, I noticed something - Mari flew farther then Emmet. Maybe if I could separate them...  
>I slashed upwards in between them, forcing them away from each other. Afterwards, I jumped in the middle and slashed at Mari. She flew into the air and I followed her and gave her an aerial slash. She fell down and tried to recover, but I hit her with the hilt of my sword, dazing her. I gave her a final kick, causing her to fall. And fall. And fall. People seem to be falling off cliffs a lot today.<br>"You son of a-" Emmet cursed as he flew towards me. I couldn't block this, and he was a great deal stronger than me. Even without Mari, this attack could kill me. I had a good chance of falling off of the cliff. I tried to block, closing my eyes. As if that would stop the Goth Climber from killing my PC. Then, something unexpected happened.  
>Out of nowhere, probably from a higher ledge, a black Bowser fell onto Emmet. The spiked shell of the turtle smashed into the Climber, killing him on contact. As the Climber PC transformed into a trophy, the Bowser slid off of it, comically struggling to get up.<br>"Agh!" he exclaimed, "Help me up!"  
>I did so.<br>"What the hell was that about?" I asked.  
>"Sorry, geez. I didn't know that I was going to land on your friend."<br>"N-no! That fucker wasn't my friend! Actually, I'm kind of glad you fell on him. I got some nice experience for it. What's your name, by the way?"  
>"Uh, I'm Gammaboy3. Call me Gamma, though."<br>"All right, Gamma. If you don't mind, I'd appreciate it if you would join our party. As long as you're in the League, of course."  
>"Uh, sure? This is all kind of sudden. I'm a Lieutenant, so I don't get invited to too many parties, having just solo quests and all."<br>"I know, right?" Wolf muttered.  
>"Well," I said, "welcome to our party, Gamma!"<br>"Cool."  
>"Uh," Shadow said, getting everyone's attention, "we had better get going. If a hacks search party gets here before we leave, then the Assembly will dock my pay!"<br>"Yeah, yeah." I said.  
>And so we did. The way down was even creepier than the way up - it was dark out, and the then invisible rubies in the skull rocks' eyes were glowing a little. To add to the creepy atmosphere, some sort of really dark heavy metal music had become the BGM. It seemed quicker on the way down, though. Probably because everyone was too scared to speak. After roughly seven or eight minutes, we had finally gotten to the gate.<br>"Well," Shadow announced, "here's where we all split ways. I'm going to go report to the Assembly. I'll bring back some gifts for you guys with my wonderfully fat purse!"  
>She suddenly vanished into a cloud of snow and ice. Probably a teleportation spell. Everyone else dispersed. As I turned to walk towards my house, I noticed that Gamma was following me.<br>"Why are you following me?"  
>"My house is this way."<br>"Oh."  
>We walked in silence for a bit. Finally, we came to my house, and I turned.<br>"Is this your house?" he asked.  
>"Yeah. Why?"<br>"I live next door. What a coincidence."  
>I walked further towards my house, but acted in surprise when something jumped at me from the bushes to the right. It was a smaller Bowser, green in color. It tried to scratch me, but I shoved it off and hit it with the flat of my sword. It snarled at me and I slashed it again. Finally, I kicked it. It stopped attacking and spoke.<br>"Urgh...fine! I'll get you again! Killa7 shall have his revenge! You hear?"  
>He ran away. <em>I guess he's "Killa7"? Meh. Who cares?<em>  
>Gamma had ignored the battle and gotten into his own house. I guess it was time for me to do the same. I entered the house and had FireMaster use the bed. I'm sure he'd be tired.<p>

That's my second chapter. What did you think? Be completely honest with me. I could still use constructive criticism at any time. I'll have my next chapter up as soon as I can. Hope you read more of my story.


	3. Confusion

Welcome to the next chapter. Yay it is finally done. I first want to thank you for reading this far. I apologize for calling the game Smashtasm last chapter, but I will be fixing that soon. Now I better stop talking before I bore you to death.  
>Another "day" of Smash World. I couldn't tell how long it had been IRL because my lights were off, I didn't have a clock and I was too lazy to draw back the curtains and see the sun. Or moon. Or whatever the hell there would be out there.<br>I pulled "myself" out of my bed. It had been just two in-game days since I had started playing, but I already had plenty of friends. Could that possibly be coincidental? Was it some sort of sick twist of destiny that forced me into an alliance with these quirky players? Or could it possibly be a natural occurrence? Did everyone have a similar experience?  
>Before that question was answered, I found a box in front of my door. I picked it up and sat back down on my bed. I opened the box and was surprised to see two slips of paper and a chisel-like object. First, I picked up a paper that looked like a letter. A pop-up came up on my screen. It was typed up in cursive font, so it was a little hard to read.<br>_Hey, FireMaster! It's me, Shadow! This is a little thank you gift for the quest yesterday. It's to help get you started on your abilities. I had a friend at the assembly design it for you. If you use the chisel to chisel the design into your sword, then you should unlock a new ability. He says the design is a new rune he created. He calls it "Del Fuego," and he says it's Spanish for "of the fire." It shouldn't take you too long - he engraved the chisel with a speed rune. I gave everyone else money, and this cost a lot of it. Hope you're happy._  
><em>PrincessShadow<em>  
>Well. That must have been where it came from.<br>I took the chisel out of the box. It had what looked like a sideways "S" with two ten pointed stars, one inside one of the S's loops, the other in the second one. I picked up my sword as well and put it on my lap. Originally, Ike's sword is called the "Ragnell." Would its name change if I carved a brand-new never before seen rune into it? I pulled out the design. It looked rather simple. It was a capital "T" with a single dot above the T's dash and two dots below it. I placed the chisel on the blade and began to, well, chisel it. My PC's hands were moving _incredibly_ fast. This chisel must have been enchanted - I was done with the work within thirty seconds! The sword glowed red for a second and a message has appeared on the screen.  
><em>Your default "Ragnell" has been enchanted. "Ragnell" has transformed into "Zjarr."<em>  
><em>How the hell do you pronounce that?<em>  
>Ignoring the insane name, I set the chisel and papers into the box and walked out of the door. I noticed that there was a small button labeled "1" on the lower left part of the screen. I assumed it was a new attack and that I could use by pressing 1. I couldn't wait to try it out. And I wouldn't have to wait long. Outside, by the street, I saw that "Killa7" guy from "yesterday" and some new freak. He was a Falco PC clad in green.<br>"Muahahahaha!" Killa7 exclaimed, "Together, we will defeat you, weakling?"  
><em>Did he just say "Muahahahaha?" Who <em>**says**___that?_  
>"Look," I said, "I don't have time to kill you fuckers. Why don't you go and shove your attitude where it belongs?"<br>"Excuse me, but I think me and Greg'll be wiping the floor with you this time."  
>"Okay...then I guess you're going to fight me?"<br>"Duh! Yes!"  
>"Greg" stayed pretty much silent until now. He lunged at me in a blur and knocked me away a little.<br>_A battle? I guess this is the best time to try it out..._  
>But before that, I slashed at Killa7, who had jumped at me and tried to slash at me with his claws. However, I jumped straight over him and hit him with my new Zjarr. It might have just been me, but for a second, I thought a golden flame licked at him. When Greg shot at me with a laser pistol, I blocked the blasts with my sword and ran back at them. I threw a horizontal slash, hitting both of them. They bounced off my house like it was rubber and seemed thoroughly stunned. This was the best time.<br>I pressed down the 1 key on my keyboard, which I had set aside since I used a controller to play this game, and suddenly, the words "Fuego Blade" appeared on the bottom of my screen. My PC held out his sword and I watched in half awe and half horror as my blade lit up with gold-bronze flames. With the flames added on, my sword was around nine feet long. I still swung it around like it was a toothpick, though. I slashed at them both, and the fire acted solid. It knocked them pretty far away. Maybe I charged it too much...with that one swing, they flew far away enough that they turned around and ran off.  
>"Wimps."<br>I turned to see everyone else gathered on the street.  
>"Congratulations." Dragon muttered, although he was obviously somewhat impressed.<br>"Hey!" Shadow said, and I walked towards the group, "who the hell were those people, anyways?"  
>"Some wimps named Killa7 and Greg. Why?"<br>"Uh...what? That...has to be a coincidence."  
>"Huh? Why?"<br>"Because those are the players that got banned during the Great Hacks Incident a few years ago."  
>"What?"<br>"It started this whole war with the hacks and us. 1337f0x and this Greg guy started hacking the hell out of each other and in the end, Greg and his friend Killa7 got banned and 1337f0x and Super64 were made heroes of the new ruling anti-hacking association called the League. Then they started this nice little online settlement-turned-capital-city. They started an HQ here and now we know this place as Leonsburg, the Silver City. Coincidentally, there were no cities, towns or areas until after the Incident. Until that, we traveled between the areas of Melee and Brawl."  
>"I didn't...really need to know this. But thanks...?"<br>"You're welcome."  
>We all resumed whatever they had been doing before they saw my fight. However, I soon noticed that something - no, someone - was missing.<br>"Where's the Hero of Vexation?"  
>"Vexation? That's a long word for <em>you<em> to use, FireMaster." Shadow replied.  
>"Where's Link?"<br>"We left him. Now hurry up so he doesn't catch up to us!"  
>Obviously, everyone was very serious about leaving Link behind. Dragon flew off with his wings, Shadow teleported to the top of a nearby building and started teleporting from roof to roof, ninja style. 1337 was using his Fox Illusion to run away quickly. Wolf was running on all fours, and surprisingly, he was roughly as fast as Sonic. Gamma, whom I hadn't noticed was there until just now, was waddling (turtles waddle, don't they?) as fast as he could. Everyone else was simply running like the Apocalypse was upon them. I guessed that they might be a little bit pissed if I simply waited for that freak to show up, so I ran off with them. As I dashed through town, I noticed how many people actually lived in this "Leonsburg."<p>

There were players crossing my path every two or three seconds. I had never noticed before, but this was a huge city, full of so many players. It was so weird. Like in a real city...

We all met up next to the gate, as usual. Everyone was there. Except for Dragon - he was only there physically. Never mentally.

"C'mon!" Dragon exclaimed, "We have to go before-"

"Hey guys!" Link exclaimed, "You didn't wait too long, did you?"

"H-how did you find us? You weren't supposed to know about us leaving you!"

"Oh, Super64 put it on his blog."

"...What? Really...?"

"Yeah, check this out-"

A little screen popped up in front of Link's face and displayed a message. It looked like any old blog post. This one was special, though. It would give us all reason to kill that mod.

Super64: _lol, were runnin from link so he wont bothr evry1._

Link: _oh yeah? where 2?_

Super64: _the leonsburg g8. u'll nvr get us...:p_

"Oh, really?" I growled, turning my attention to 64.  
>"Why would you do something so...dumb?" Dragon exclaimed.<br>"I'll kill you!" we said in unison. Creepy.  
>After a lot of chasing, my PC was too "tired" to keep running. Thus, we decided to ignore the problem until later. We just kept walking, following Shadow. Wherever the hell that would lead us to. We had been walking in pretty much absolute silence for a while, besides 1337f0x occasionally asking Super64 where he learned to write "leet."<br>Soon, I couldn't take it anymore.  
>"Shadow! Where the hell are we going?"<br>"I don't know. Isn't it nice to just relax every once in a while? We're just exploring today."  
>"Lies! You always have an ulterior motive!"<br>"I do not! Okay, maybe it was that one time...and that other one..."  
>"How much money are you getting paid?"<br>"Oh, that doesn't matter. All that matters is that my job is to show you and anyone else I know that haven't joined the army yet that we soldiers have fun, too."  
>"Only the Captains and higher..." Wolf muttered.<br>"What was that, Lieutenant? Or do I mean Private?"  
>"Er, I get the picture."<br>Confused, I just tried to absorb that information. This army, which, whether I like it or not, is trying to get me to join it, seems to be a little lenient with its Majors. Or maybe just Major PrincessShadow. Until then, though, I guess you're just a pawn. At least Wolf and Gamma were big pawns. I didn't even know how anyone else fit into the picture.  
>"Ganondorf!" Link exclaimed after charging after a PC only a few "yards" away. This was quickly responded to by a punch in the face and evil laughter.<br>"Oh, Link," a surprisingly feminine voice said, "don't you ever learn?"  
>"Hi, BlakBerri!" 64 greeted, "It's good to see you again!"<br>"Yeah, whatever. What are you people doing this far from the capital?"  
>"Oh, we're observing the amazing Major Shadow, The Ice Rose."<br>"Ice Rose?" I interjected, "What the hell is this about, Shadow?"  
>"Oh," she explained, "everyone Captain rank and above are given titles. Mine is The Ice Rose. 'Ice' because of my abilities and 'Rose' because my looks are quite deceptive."<br>To prove her point, she let out an innocent sounding giggle, and I almost vomited. Somehow, all the other guys were breathless. Obviously, America's intelligence is declining worse than anyone ever thought - I mean, really?  
>"Well," the Ganondorf PC said, "sorry for beating up on Link. You probably need him for something."<br>"Nah..." Dragon said, "hey, anyone else get the urge to go to the bathroom?"  
>Everyone but me - even Link - responded with a yes. I felt all alone as the term AFK - away from keyboard (but we use controllers...?) - appeared above everyone's heads. I wasn't alone for long, though. Soon, I saw another Ike character, who looked exactly like my character. Maybe it was, so I walked towards it. It did the same. When I stopped, it stopped. I took my sword out, and it did, too. Simultaneously, we swung our swords up and down. Finally, I took a final decision. I punched it square in the face and it flew back. It hadn't even attempted to guard, thinking that I was merely a reflection, like I thought about <em>it<em>.

Just then, everyone else got back online. They obviously questioned me about the poor Ike sprawled out in front of me. I quickly explained that I thought there was a mirror there since our costumes were the same. BlakBerri laughed, because there were no mirrors in the middle nowhere. I felt kind of embarrassed, but we were all kind of worried about the Ike PC.

I helped him up, and he shook his head, as if it were full of water.

"Ugh...my head..."

"A-are you okay? Sorry I, er, punched you in the face..."

"It's all right...but how come you have the exact same costume as mine?"

"I don't know! Wait, give me a sec. I'll change my costume right...now."

I had gotten much better at this game - I knew how to navigate around the stuff. For example, I learned how to change my cape into a red cape. Now, we looked different, though it was just by a bit.

"There," I continued, "now we look different. What's your name, anyways?"

"I'm Flame. How about you guys?"

We all introduced ourselves to him.

"All right...FireMaster, huh? We have similar clothes, same character and similar names. I wonder what kind of abilities you have...?"

I pressed "1" (again, hard because I use a controller) and my blade burst into flame once again. Flame seemed a little surprised at first, but quickly formed a sword - out of fire - in his hand. He swung it horizontally I noticed something - unlike mine, it was Ragnell-sized and it had an effect on the area it swung at. The fire lingered in the air for a bit, as if waiting for prey. With nothing to burn, it soon went out with whip-like cracks a loud "bang!" sound. It seemed to detonate like a small bomb. Without his Blaze Edge - as I soon learned he called it - he had no other weapon. He soon explained that he had learned Blaze Edge the second he logged on and that he had soon unlocked another ability after getting a rune from someone in the League army, which he had soon joined.

"Well," Shadow said, examining the rune on the Blaze Edge, "you must know the same player I know. There's only two people I know that can make runic abilities that well, and only one is in the army. Still, that rune doesn't read 'of the fire' like FireMaster's Zjarr. What does it read, then to give it fire abilities?"

"I heard from the guy that it reads 'straight from Hell,' in Albanian. I think it reads off...'direkt nga ferri'...which reminds me. Zjarr is Albanian for fire, right? I Google Translated it while I was talking to you all."

"Yeah. Most runes are read Albanian, although gods know how they figure out how to write it - Albanian looks nothing like that."

"How would you know?"

"School. Don't ask."

With a few murmurs, I noticed my screen was flashing yellow.

"What the fuck?" I exclaimed, "My screen's flashing, and I'm not being attacked!"

"Oh," Dragon explained, eager to spread his not-so-infinite wisdom, "that means you're hungry! We should find a fast food place or something; my hunger bar - which is the yellow bar above your HP bar, by the way - is almost depleted."

"Fast food? Really?"

"Oh," Flame said, "I, uh, saw a taco stand, like, two minutes and three and a half seconds back there." He gestured behind him.

"Taco stands? Really? And why the hell are you being so exact?"

Obviously ignoring me, everyone turned and followed Flame to the taco stand. Why would they have fast food and tacos in a video fucking game? That didn't matter, though. Much like a certain guy in green, I tried to catch up to the group. When I finally did, they had sat down at a picnic table and had some food ready for everyone.

"Let's eat!" Super64 exclaimed, shoving the whole taco into his mouth.

_Holy- who eats that fast?_

Everyone else, including me, took smaller bites out of the tacos.

First was 64. He claimed his screen was flashing red, and we ignored it. Fuck. Soon enough, he had transformed into a trophy. Of course, we were all surprised. Then, all of our screens did the same.

"What the hell?" Flame exclaimed, "What was in those tacos?"

As we were all trophy-fied, we saw one last thing. The manager of the stand. A dark Link PC with a scythe instead of a sword. And then, the screen went black.

End of chapter. Exciting huh? I'll bet that you're curious about the taco stand guy that was evil enough to poison a taco. Well, you're just going to have to wait for the next chapter. I will try to have it up as soon as possible. Until then, entertain yourselves with some fanfics made by my friends. They are DragonMaster4427, YelloMage, and Gammaboy3. I hope that you keep reading.


	4. Confinement

I finally got a new chapter up. I want to thank you all for reading this story thus far. Again, I base this story off of the Smashtasm machinima. This story will actually get a plot this chapter. This is when you get excited because the story is finally getting somewhere. Anyways, I better stop talking before you get bored and decide not to read the chapter so I will shut up now.

Just a few minutes after the screen turned black, it whited out and resumed playing. I, of course, picked up the controller and got ready to play. Or, I tried. My character couldn't pull out his sword, probably because it wasn't in my inventory. My PC stood in a makeshift cell along with pretty much everyone else. The other PC's looked as confused as mine.

"Where the fuck are we?" I asked myself, walking around the cell. I would have run my fingers along the bars, but the damn game wasn't realistic enough.  
>"I don't know..." Shadow said, leaning closer to the bars, probably examining them, "but I don't like it. Anyone else got a teleportation spell?"<br>When everyone shook their heads, she grinned wickedly.  
>"Well then, goodbye suckers!"<br>She dissipated into icy mist, but came right back.  
>"Wh-what the hell? Why couldn't I telly?"<br>"I think," Dragon said thoughtfully, "we're in a cell. A _perma_-cell."  
>"Shit!"<br>"Hey," I said, "did you just try to escape? Without us?"  
>"Er...maybe? Heheh...don't kill me?"<br>No one would do that though. That would be a waste - we could kill her off and eat her later. If the game works like that. Either way, this could be a problem.  
>Suddenly, two PC's walked into the room, silent as a couple of mice. We recognized the first - the Link PC that sold us the tacos. I still can't believe it - someone is evil enough to poison tacos? What kind of sick freak would do that?<br>But, I digress.  
>Anyways, there was the black Link, red eyes, scythe, etc. The other guy was rather new. He was short, only like three feet tall. Like two Kirbies stacked on top of each other. Anyways, he had a yellow cloakrobe on, he wore a leather witchy hat and white mittens. The hat obscured his face, so all I could see were elliptic yellow eyes. I had seen something like that in one of my friend's games before...a something or another mage.  
>I heard Shadow let out a sigh and Flame crumple to the ground, probably the result of over-poisonous tacos.<br>"Hello," the Link PC said, his voice as melodic as a...something that's melodic, "I'm ChaoticReaper. This is my subordinate Cloud. Cloud, say hi."  
>Said midget stayed quiet.<br>"Fine, be that way. Anyways, he will be watching you to make sure you don't find a way out of there. No need to teleport or log out - it's a perma-cell. In other words, you had better get used to it fast. You'll be in there for a while. Buh-bye now."  
>The "ChaoticCreeper" turned and left, leaving a stoic-midget behind. At least we could amuse ourselves for a while - we could guess what the hell he looked like underneath the hat.<br>While everyone else whined and cried for not being able to escape, Shadow seemed frighteningly calm.  
>"Uh, Shads?" I asked, "Are you okay? I mean, we're stuck in a perma-cell."<br>"Yeah. So? I have a feeling that we're not going to be here long."  
>I was very confused. She shot a glance at "Cloud," but he disregarded it. Just then, Lamp had a brilliant idea.<br>"One day, a man told me that I would be locked in a cell with a furry-"  
>He turned to 1337f0x and Wolf for a second and turned back, "-and that if I punched my friend in the face, that I would be free, <em>forever<em>."  
>At first, all we got was a chuckle from Super64 and a rolling of the eyes from f0x. Finally, we all agreed that it was indeed worth a try. And so came the event that absolutely made the day.<br>He turned, wound his fist up and punched..._Link_ in the face.  
>This earned several cheers, a few raising of eyebrows and one very loud yelp.<br>"Hey!" Link exclaimed, "What was that for? You're like twice my level now; I could have died!"  
><em>If only, if only.<em>  
>"I think that's enough talking." Cloud said in a horror-movie voice, standing up slowly. He raised up a staff that had earlier not been noticeable, and a small ball of yellow light formed at the tip. This, of course, had an interesting effect on us all.<br>"Ah, fuck!" Gamma exclaimed.  
>"What-" Flame began to ask.<br>Suddenly, a bolt of lightning ripped through the bars, leaving molten metal behind.  
>"-the heck just happened?" Flame finished, almost breathless.<br>Shadow stepped out effortlessly, "Come on," she said, "let's go, chop-chop."  
>The rest of us stood there for a while to figure out <em>what had just happened<em>.  
>But we followed blindly. Like we always do.<br>Soon, we were navigating the halls, trying to get out. Finally, we had come across a very large door. It had ornate handles and they were about twelve feet high. Cloud walked toward it and it opened automatically. I guess the hackers knew how to do stuff like that?  
>As we walked outside, we were surprised to see that instead of the grimy prison on the inside, the "HQ" looked a lot like a regal castle. It was "dark" out, and it was well past the game's dusk. Cloud pulled us up behind a large hill.<br>"All right," he said, "I'll leave the rest to you Shadow."  
>"And how are you gonna explain your way outta this one, Colonel?"<br>"Same way I always do. 'The repair men must have forgotten about a broken link.'"  
>"Speaking of a broken Link..." Shadow turned to Link, "this one has low health. Have a potion or something?"<br>"No. What am I, your personal storage facility?"  
>"Uh," I broke in, "what the <em>fuck <em> is this about, Shadow?"  
>"Oh," she said, "this is Colonel Cloud. Cloud, say hi."<br>Again, he stayed silent when prompted to say hi.  
>Shadow sighed, "He isn't normally like this. He becomes a stoic when he does his whole double agent routine-"<br>After she said that, Cloud jumped and hit her on the head with his staff.  
>"What the hells wrong with you?" he exclaimed, "I was enjoying the suspense! Oh well. Yes, I am a double agent. I work with hackers, but I'm only a warden, currently. I help people to escape perma-cells and I do small sabotages. In the meantime, I make runes and maps for the League."<br>"Oh." I said, "Well now I feel sort of stupid. So...you're the guy that goes around and makes runes for people? Like mine?"  
>"Well, I'm not the only one, but yeah, yours is a custom I made. It's pretty interesting. Instead of using fire as a projectile, this rune uses fire to increase your attack range and your attack power. It was a very, very complicated program. For example: the binary coding for it was several pages long, the graphicking took days and I needed help to finish up the integration system."<br>"Uh," Dragon said, "what do all those words mean?"  
>"Well, binary code is coding made completely of ones and zeroes. Graphicking is where you make the art. Integration is-"<br>"No more..." Shadow groaned. If the game had been realistic at all, she would be on the ground, holding her head and screaming.  
>"Okay. Anyways, you need to leave. I'll stay here and continue working." he stopped for a sec and looked behind Shadow, "What the hell is that over there?"<br>We all turned around, but not in time.  
>An enormous albino ape lunged at Shadow. The ape was a Donkey Kong PC. It attempted to slap her, but she quickly dodged back and let loose an Absolute Zero. As the ice exploded against its fur, it was encased in a cold cocoon.<br>"So," I said, examining the PC, "you wanna crack the idiot?"  
>"With <em>much<em> pleasure." she said. She was about to wave her hand, signaling for the victim to crack, Cloud put his staff in the way."  
>"Shadow, this player isn't with the hackers."<br>"Oh? How do you know that?"  
>"He's level one, hasn't gained a single experience point and he didn't know how to use any combos. If he was with them, he would have already gone on at least one mission, he would've gained thirty points just for joining a faction and you're taught how to actually fight when you get a senior and-"<br>"Yeah, you get a senior the second you apply for a faction."  
>So, we thought this over. The facts were flimsy, but we came to the conclusion that he was really just a retard who knew <em>nothing<em> about the game. And the fact that attacking Shadow results in DEATH!  
>The defrosting took longer than you would think...instead of being a temporary status condition, a "heat source" was required to "cure" it. And so I spent, like, ten minutes "curing" the DK PC. Flame helped a little, but it was more useful to have a fire chisel than a sword that can fire fireballs in a situation like that. He was out in just a bit, and he seemed to have learned his lesson.<br>"Okay," Shadow said menacingly, "touch a single button, and you die."  
>"Uh-huh." the DK replied nervously.<br>"Do you know_ how to play_?"  
>"Uh...no."<br>Shadow let out a very large sigh. Then, she proceeded to explain the mechanics of Smash World. It only took a bit, and she was very good about it. When he made a mistake, she only _almost_ killed him. Soon enough, he was no longer a threat. But still, that didn't mean we couldn't be safe...  
>"Are you sure that those pillars of unstable rock aren't going to come down and crush him or something?" I asked Cloud.<br>"Oh, relax. According to Rule 74 of the Handbook to Life, if something is very obviously dangerous, go for it."  
>"And according to Rule 86, if something can go wrong, it will."<br>"And according to Rule 34-" Gamma started to say.  
>"No!" we exclaimed.<br>Cloud continued, "We _don't _need to hear about Rule 34 right now. We're trying to keep this 'T' rated!"  
>He was hit in the back of the head by Shadow.<br>"What did I tell you about that fourth wall? Geez. Stupid amateurs."  
>Anyways, we had set up a fail proof - large pillars of rock that looked rather unstable were placed around the DK as we slowly milked all information out of him that we could. For example, his username was "HairyMan" (yeah, no kidding...education is lacking in America) and he did not have anything to do with the hacks at <em>all<em>. With nothing else to do, we let him come with us. Heck*, he'd make a good meatshield.  
>We weren't done yet, though. Apparently this place was a little more crowded than Leonsburg or any other place. Only a minute after we calmed down from the last run-in, a red kirby came by. And by came by, I mean he acted like an absolute MOTHA FUCKER.<br>"Guys," Shadow said, readying an Absolute Zero, at which point HairyMan hid behind a rock, "there's someone over there."  
>The Kirby came out quickly, but slowed when he saw us.<br>"Who the poop are you?" he asked in a scratchy, high-pitched voice.  
>"Uh..." I answered, "we, uh...are people. We were just leaving, really..."<br>"Leaving IN BED!" he exclaimed, at which point he started laughing annoyingly.  
>"No, young idiot," Cloud said, "leaving this place. We're taking our business elsewhere."<br>"Your business, huh? Your BED business!"  
>"No, we just need to go somewhere else." I explained.<br>"Ooh, you guys are SICK!"  
>At this point, we were pissed, to say the least. Because of that...<br>"Okay," Shadow exclaimed, "that's IT! You are dead meat you little piece of-"  
>"That's what she said."<br>After that, the Kirby jumped up and over Shadow. When he hit the ground, he immediately sucked up Link's sword and out popped one for him. And a special hat. Because it wouldn't be Kirby if he didn't have a special hat.  
>Afterwards, he ran off. And we were left alone. Minus a sword.<br>"Well." Flame said, exasperated, "That was..."  
>"Weird?" Super64 suggested.<br>"Yeah. Weird."  
>Shadow teleported after him, screaming, "I'll get you, you little piece of shit!"<br>1337f0x sighed, "Well, that's quite a girl."  
>"Not quite." I said, "She's more like an 'it'."<br>"Hey!" Shadow's voice could still be heard, "I'm still monitoring the party's chatroom!"  
>Shrugging, we decided to follow. It wasn't like we could do much without Shadow. She was the team's leader, no matter how much of a pain she was.<br>Soon, we came to where she had stopped - a small cliff. The Kirby was backed up to the very edge. If this had been a dramatic, serious anime, then he would be sweating and clenching his teeth and dramatic music would be playing.  
>"Oh, come on!" he exclaimed, "The abilities of this sword suck, anyways. Why would you want them back?"<br>"Because their my abilities!" Link exclaimed, sounding exaggeratedly hurt.  
>"Well, I don't care about Link's abilities. I just wanna kick your fat red ass." Shadow said tauntingly.<br>"Well, too bad!" he exclaimed, "'Cuz I'm stronger than the rest of-"  
>He stopped talking when he realized that he had just been splashed with ice cold water.<br>"I'm sorry," Cloud mumbled, "I couldn't help myself. Now then..." he waved his staff up and the water on the Kirby became a larger pillar of water and wrapped around the sword, yanking it from the PC's hands. The sword clanged against the ground, as Cloud smirked.  
>"Any good chess player thinks one move ahead. A great one thinks five moves ahead. I've thought ten moves ahead. And you're in Check."<br>"Whoa," Dragon said, in awe, "that sounded _totally_ epic."  
>"Meh. I improvised it based on something from-"<br>"Shut up!" the Kirby yelled, lunging at Cloud. With another wave of the staff, a huge wall of earth quickly rose from the ground. Unfortunately for the Kirby, physics don't apply to video games. Instead of dying on impact, he flattened against it with a "splat" and stopped moving. Things were silent for a bit.  
>"Me thinks this is 'Mate'." Cloud snickered.<br>"Well, that was impressive." Shadow said, patting Cloud on the head.  
>"Colonel," HairyMan said, "how did you get so strong?"<br>"Simple; I drink people's blood."  
>"...What?"<br>"Geez, it's so hard to joke when people take you seriously."  
>"Anyways," Shadow said with a shrug, "let's loot him."<br>"Like in World of Warcraft?" I asked.  
>"Sort of...he didn't die, but he's paralyzed. Might as well loot him. I'll see what he has."<br>Shadow went around the new slab of rock and examined the Kirby pancake thoroughly. She peeled him off the rock and slammed him onto the ground. Somehow, when she picked him back up and shook him, objects started randomly falling out of him and onto the ground. First was gold. Then some healing items. Next was a membership card, something you get when you reach level 10. The name on it was "BoneBlade," so we assumed it was his username. No weapons came out, which was obvious - Kirby PC's stole weapons and the abilities attached to them.

In all, most of us doubled our money and we were all fully healed. It didn't feel right, even on an online game. But still...the little bastard deserved it. Honestly, attacking us, of all people?

Soon afterwards, we left. We had no specific goal in mind. Cloud still hadn't explained much. I decided that needed to change.

"Cloud, what exactly are we supposed to do now that we're out of 'prison'?"

"Well, I expected everything to go cleanly, but I guess you'll just have to go straight to Leonsburg."

"As long as we don't have any more interruptions."

"Yep. And with three so far, I don't think anything else will happen."

And just as we were walking, a shape lunged out of the bushes and tackled Dragon.

"Damn it!" Shadow exclaimed, "No more!"

Sorry about the cliffhanger but I think I should stop here for now. Hopefully next chapter will be even better than this one. I will get that one up as soon as I can but that might take a while, so in the meantime read my friends Fanfics. They are YelloMage, Gammaboy3, and Dragonmaster4427. They are all writing good Fanfics so read those while waiting for mine. I'm getting redundant now, so, until next time.


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